Osvaldo Oyola and Kailyn Kent had an interesting conversation in comments about the X-Men and policing mutants; I thought I’d reprint it here.
I think you hit on something I have been saying for a while about the racial and sexual other in superhero comics – they have to prove their worthiness through violence against and/or policing of others of their kind. The X-Men (esp. early X-men, but definitely into Claremont’s classic run) just reinforces this and is all the more egregious by white-washing the difference to begin with.
Xavier could only be MLK if MLK had armed young black soldiers that went into black communities to violently combat the threats to black middle-class respectability that he cared about above all – in other words, it doesn’t jibe with MLK both ideologically and in practicality.
Osvaldo, that’s a really good point. X-Men makes it particularly evident, through its use of an ensemble cast of many superheroes and supervillains. But this self-policing, masochism and assimilation seems like a foundational part of the genre. And one that I think comics is congratulated for– the ‘nobility’ of a guardian who loses his ability to ‘be one’ with the society he’s protecting. Or, how pure these fantasies are, coming from the brains of marginalized Jewish teenagers at the turn of the century.
There’s convincing evidence for superheroes stemming out of the stage and dime-novel melodramas (Alex Buchet’s work, for example.) Melodrama, when not fully occupied with sawmills and speeding trains, navigates a weird zone between comedy and tragedy– an unreconcilable schism is presented between the protagonist and society, which the narrative itself can’t solve, and so absolves it through a unifying trauma which stitches everyone back together. This is often the trauma of near death to a female body, the heroine lies freezing on an ice floe speeding towards a waterfall, etc. etc. Once she is rescued, it magically doesn’t matter that she’s still a fallen women, when the society that embraces her hasn’t come close to amending their value system.
To wind back to the central concept– while I’ve heard ‘secret identities,’ and ‘serialized thrills’ spouted as reasons for superhero comics to be melodramas, I’ve never heard them discussed as assimilationist fantasies. But it fits really well.
And melodrama is important! Probably no other narrative mode has had a great as influence on society and politics in the last few centuries, and melodrama increasingly pervades political and campaign imagery. Melodramas are ‘people-movers,’ and make whatever story they’re conveying especially sticky.
The image here is by Rick Remender/Oliver Coipel from Uncanny Avengers #5.
These comments have flushed out and help me understand some very important elements behind my own one sided relationship with the X-Men:
It has been a rocky one. like many 80’s kids I was living mostly with my Mom when introduced to the X-Men. I was lucky, my Dad was very much a part of my brothers and my life. He also is a progressive child & family Psychologist, Jewish and a good egg. So he was very present and sensitive to our cultural challenges (more on this next) and needs as kids. However, the day to day parental involvement was mostly with Mom. My Mom was a bit unique (who’s isn’t). Her cultural background was growing up in a enlightened educated typical Oklahoman White Christian Middle Class home. Being whip smart & artistic slightly older then my Hippy Father, she had already lived a life of exploration and marriage, before even meeting my Dad. By the time she was divorced for the second time with two kids, she was fully engaged in a Feminist life. An Architect with a solid ethical and aesthetic compass, she had two boys to raise. Her daily example didn’t jive with my X-Men comics. I would project true heroics and feminist ideals on the characters. Often finding the images, dialogue and plot points failing to reflect my image of women. This was not always the case. Sometimes my favorites Kitty Pryde, Storm, Rogue, Skids, even Meggan would be depicted as was reflective of my home and most women in my life. Thankfully these moments kept me involved in Comics. I still check in on them and their progress. Often discouraged. The first time I stopped reading about them was ironically (given the past few days) when Scott Lobdell took over. I really can’t understand as a kid and as an adult, why they can’t make these characters reflect my wishes for them. Are these not fantasy wish fulfillment stories? One side relationships suck.
I am really glad we are mentioning the Jewish background depicting analogy of Civil Rights in context of Assimilation Melodrama. I identify with Comics and it’s history with a paradoxical mix of pride and horror. My Mom’s path left her Oklahoma background, but never left the salt of the earth ethics of her parents. My Dad held on tighter to his cultural heritage, while analyzing every mistake his parents made in easing their kids. I hope, Lee & Kirby weren’t as bad at parenting as my Grandfather, but when I see machismo on Mad Men or read about sexism in the comics created by the Greatest Generations Jewish Cartoonists, I see my Grandfather. He was a fascinating character who’s ego grossly ravaged the lives in his family. I LOVE my Jewish heritage and our cultures role in American culture (especially Comics), but the men in this community created characters that often tried to both serve survivors guilt and fetished machismo. They changed their names to be accepted by the Arian culture they lived in, fear of business failure or even repeating the horrors that drove them out of the old country made it so, like in our family, Hebrew was out and Christmas was in. There own experiences allowed for them to sympathize with and exploited Blacks in American. It’s unclear to me if the Assimilation removed a community cloak covering a complex, colorful and shameful sexual history. The access to the developing Comics medium, coinciding with the Jewish man being removed from small close knit communities may have helped empower the secular aspects of our people that had always been there, but allowed for public fetish. Both of which I don’t take issue with, but vocally condemn their use in eroding ethical behavior and creating a hostile environment to women in Comics.
These two prospectives frustrate my place as a Comics fan (of all genres) and complicate my own Cartooning process. I am particularly repulsed by the history of “Women in Refidgerators” eluded to above. I do not object to sexuality or depiction of the human form in that context. However, it would be nice if the heroics and sexuality were displayed in equal measure and marketed appropriately given the developmental level of the audience.
Now to the real point: We have white Jewish men with survivors guilt trying to sell comics, by staying current. They project their own totally lagit sense of failure in empowerment into a matter they cannot fully understand. In addition to my above background, I also happen to have been raised in a mostly Black neighborhood when introduced to the X-Men. So both the Jewish experience and the African-American experience was present along with the gender (and sexual orientation…since it was Berkeley as AIDs was introduced) in my mind as I read the Comics as a Kid. We were all into Ninja, but most of my neighbors had been intimately connected to the Black Panther movement (which was still present in our community). So the subject of violence against the oppression of White America was topical. What was a growing reality and a daily experience was the violence of Black on Black. Self regulating through words was very common. Self regulating through violence occurred, but usually was predictably ineffective. Mostly it was about power.
Now power is what this all comes down to. This notion that to feel self worth there needs to be domination over the other. This sense of control is what Superhero Comics are about. I wish it was about responsibility, doing the right thing. But most of the time it is marred down in the dramas of political power struggles & sexual power struggles. It has been hard to escape from this. We understand why white males depict this in comics. We have power and we have fear if it being taken away. Our sense of security. What is also at play is that we Jews (my other half) were once slaves, have been driven away from half the places on the globe, my family ran from the Tzar others from Nazi. What we have been trying to teach ourselves about taking the high road has been undermined by our experience. Our oppressors have effectively taught us Assimilation and that Power is an effective means to survival and security. Thus our actions in the Middle East and our sexual crimes in closed Ultra Orthadox communities. It is also why we have Superhero Comics; there were some before Superman, but Siegel was reacting to the lack of Power and Parent in the wake of loosing his father in a robbery and rise of Hitler. This lesson from Oppressive Power also carried out in my old neighborhood. Despite what was clearly understood in our lessons of MLK, the lessons of long forgotten Masters still haunted my neighbors. A small few, struggled with loss of power and took it out on others in our community. Including me. So I read Superhero comics…and like everyone else was being let down by it’s content.
Hey thanks to Noah for highlighting my comments (and Kailyn’s) for more consideration.
Ben, I haven’t gotten a chance to read your long response/comments yet – but when I do I will be sure to come back and add more – but damn, if you plan to write so much in the comments in the future, you should pitch Noah a post of your own! :)
Anyway, I wanted to provide a link to long comments of my own from back when the controversy for the included panels above from Uncanny X-Men #5 that I made over at Multiversity.
You can jump to the comments here: http://multiversitycomics.com/news/the-rundown-weighing-in-on-hobo-piss-gate-sixth-gungame-of-thrones-cross-over-and-more/#comments
Or read the ill-considered view of the issue that I was responding to first: http://multiversitycomics.com/news/the-rundown-weighing-in-on-hobo-piss-gate-sixth-gungame-of-thrones-cross-over-and-more/
Osvaldo, once you read it you will discover my Dyslexic spelling and grammar. That alone will diture Noah. I maybe verbose and have an occasional good idea, but I think the comment section is where I should be. Thanks though.
Also, my reference survival guilt is a pretty liberal use of the term. They were not actually there.
Just a note, Noah — You misattributed the art. That’s definitely by Oliver Coipel, not John Cassaday.
Ah, okay. I had trouble finding the right attribution. Thanks for the correction.